Sir Samuel Ferguson.

1810-1886

720   Cashel of Munster

FROM THE IRISH

I’D wed you without herds, without money or rich array,
And I’d wed you on a dewy morn at day-dawn gray;
My bitter woe it is, love, that we are not far away
In Cashel town, tho’ the bare deal board were our marriage-
       bed this day!

O fair maid, remember the green hill-side,
Remember how I hunted about the valleys wide;
Time now has worn me; my locks are turn’d to gray;
They year is scarce and I am poor—but send me not, love,
       away!

O deem not my blood is of base strain, my girl;
O think not my birth was as the birth of a churl;
Marry me and prove me, and say soon you will
That noble blood is written on my right side still.

My purse holds no red gold, no coin of the silver white;
No herds are mine to drive through the long twilight;
But the pretty girl that would take me, all bare tho’ I be and lone,
O, I’d take her with me kindly to the county Tyrone!

O my girl, I can see ’tis in trouble you are;
And O my girl, I see ’tis your people’s reproach you bear!
—I am a girl in trouble for his sake with whom I fly,
And, O, may no other maiden know such reproach as I!

721   The Fair Hills of Ireland

FROM THE IRISH

A PLENTEOUS place is Ireland for hospitable cheer,
                      Uileacan dubh O!
Where the wholesome fruit is bursting from the yellow barley ear;
                      Uileacan dubh O!
There is honey in the trees where her misty vales expand,
And her forest paths in summer are by falling waters fann’d,
There is dew at high noontide there, and springs i’ the yellow
         sand,
              On the fair hills of holy Ireland.

Curl’d he is and ringleted, and plaited to the knee—
                      Uileacan dubh O!
Each captain who comes sailing across the Irish Sea;
                      Uileacan dubh O!
And I will make my journey, if life and health but stand,
Unto that pleasant country, that fresh and fragrant strand,
And leave your boasted braveries, your wealth and high
    command,
                 For the fair hills of holy Ireland.

Large and profitable are the stacks upon the ground,
                      Uileacan dubh O!
The butter and the cream do wondrously abound;
                      Uileacan dubh O!
The cresses on the water and the sorrels are at hand,
And the cuckoo’s calling daily his note of music bland,
And the bold thrush sings so bravely his song i’ the forests
      grand,
              On the fair hills of holy Ireland.